On 11 September 2021, a Boeing 737-800 was instructed to discontinue an ILS approach to runway 34 at Aberdeen, climb to 3000 feet and turn left onto a westerly heading. With the Autopilot disconnected it approached the cleared altitude but before reaching it rapidly descended to just over 1500 feet above terrain before climbing away, the whole event occurring in IMC. The episode was attributed to crew overload in manual flight consequent upon the combination of the heading instructions, flap configuration changes and a complete absence of pitch trim. Both pilots’ pandemic-related lack of the usual operational recency was noted.